Russia by Donald Mackenzie Wallace

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The public, anxiously seeking after a sign, readily took thesesymptoms of change as a complete confirmation of their ardenthopes, and leaped at once to the conclusion that a vast, all-embracing system of radical reform was about to be undertaken--notsecretly by the Administration, as had been the custom in thepreceding reign when any little changes had to be made, butpublicly, by the Government and the people in common. "The hearttrembles with joy," said one of the leading organs of the Press,"in expectation of the great social reforms that are about to beeffected--reforms that are thoroughly in accordance with thespirit, the wishes, and the expectations of the public." "The oldharmony and community of feeling," said another, "which has alwaysexisted between the government and the people, save during shortexceptional periods, has been fully re-established. The absence ofall sentiment of caste, and the feeling of common origin andbrotherhood which binds all classes of the Russian people into ahomogeneous whole, will enable Russia to accomplish peacefully andwithout effort not only those great reforms which cost Europecenturies of struggle and bloodshed, but also many which thenations of the West are still unable to accomplish, in consequenceof feudal traditions and caste prejudices." The past was depictedin the blackest colours, and the nation was called upon to begin anew and glorious epoch of its history. "We have to struggle," itwas said, "in the name of the highest truth against egotism and thepuny interests of the moment; and we ought to prepare our childrenfrom their infancy to take part in that struggle which awaits everyhonest man. We have to thank the war for opening our eyes to thedark sides of our political and social organisation, and it is nowour duty to profit by the lesson. But it must not be supposed thatthe Government can, single-handed, remedy the defects. Thedestinies of Russia are, as it were, a stranded vessel which thecaptain and crew cannot move, and which nothing, indeed, but therising tide of the national life can raise and float."

Hearts beat quicker at the sound of these calls to action. Manyheard this new teaching, if we may believe a contemporaryauthority, "with tears in their eyes"; then, "raising boldly theirheads, they made a solemn vow that they would act honourably,perseveringly, fearlessly." Some of those who had formerly yieldedto the force of circumstances now confessed their misdemeanourswith bitterness of heart. "Tears of repentance," said a popularpoet, "give relief, and call us to new exploits." Russia wascompared to a strong giant who awakes from sleep, stretches hisbrawny limbs, collects his thoughts, and prepares to atone for hislong inactivity by feats of untold prowess. All believed, or atleast assumed, that the recognition of defects would necessarilyentail their removal. When an actor in one of the St. Petersburgtheatres shouted from the stage, "Let us proclaim throughout allRussia that the time has come for tearing up evil by the roots!"the audience gave way to the most frantic enthusiasm. "Altogethera joyful time," says one who took part in the excitement, "as when,after the long winter, the genial breath of spring glides over thecold, petrified earth, and nature awakens from her deathlike sleep.Speech, long restrained by police and censorial regulations, nowflows smoothly, majestically, like a mighty river that has justbeen freed from ice."

Under these influences a multitude of newspapers and periodicalswere founded, and the current literature entirely changed itscharacter. The purely literary and historical questions which hadhitherto engaged the attention of the reading public were thrownaside and forgotten, unless they could be made to illustrate someprinciple of political or social science. Criticisms on style anddiction, explanations of aesthetic principles, metaphysicaldiscussions--all this seemed miserable trifling to men who wishedto devote themselves to gigantic practical interests. "Science,"it was said, "has now descended from the heights of philosophicabstraction into the arena of real life." The periodicals wereaccordingly filled with articles on railways, banks, free-trade,education, agriculture, communal institutions, local self-government, joint-stock companies, and with crushing philippicsagainst personal and national vanity, inordinate luxury,administrative tyranny, and the habitual peculation of theofficials. This last-named subject received special attention.During the preceding reign any attempt to criticise publicly thecharacter or acts of an official was regarded as a very heinousoffence; now there was a deluge of sketches, tales, comedies, andmonologues, describing the corruption of the Administration, andexplaining the ingenious devices by which the tchinovniks increasedtheir scanty salaries. The public would read nothing that had nota direct or indirect bearing on the questions of the day, andwhatever had such a bearing was read with interest. It did notseem at all strange that a drama should be written in defence offree-trade, or a poem in advocacy of some peculiar mode oftaxation; that an author should expound his political ideas in atale, and his antagonist reply by a comedy. A few men of the oldschool protested feebly against this "prostitution of art," butthey received little attention, and the doctrine that art should becultivated for its own sake was scouted as an invention ofaristocratic indolence. Here is an ipsa pinxit of the literatureof the time: "Literature has come to look at Russia with her owneyes, and sees that the idyllic romantic personages which the poetsformerly loved to describe have no objective existence. Havingtaken off her French glove, she offers her hand to the rude, hard-working labourer, and observing lovingly Russian village life, shefeels herself in her native land. The writers of the present haveanalysed the past, and, having separated themselves fromaristocratic litterateurs and aristocratic society, have demolishedtheir former idols."

By far the most influential periodical at the commencement of themovement was the Kolokol, or Bell, a fortnightly journal publishedin London by Herzen, who was at that time an important personageamong the political refugees. Herzen was a man of education andculture, with ultra-radical opinions, and not averse to usingrevolutionary methods of reform when he considered them necessary.His intimate relations with many of the leading men in Russiaenabled him to obtain secret information of the most important andvaried kind, and his sparkling wit, biting satire, and clear,terse, brilliant style secured him a large number of readers. Heseemed to know everything that was done in the ministries and evenin the Cabinet of the Emperor,* and he exposed most mercilesslyevery abuse that came to his knowledge. We who are accustomed tofree political discussion can hardly form a conception of theavidity with which his articles were read, and the effect whichthey produced. Though strictly prohibited by the Press censure,the Kolokol found its way across the frontier in thousands ofcopies, and was eagerly perused and commented on by all ranks ofthe educated classes. The Emperor himself received it regularly,and high-priced delinquents examined it with fear and trembling.In this way Herzen was for some years, though an exile, animportant political personage, and did much to awaken and keep upthe reform enthusiasm.

* As an illustration of this, the following anecdote is told: Onenumber of the Kolokol contained a violent attack on an importantpersonage of the court, and the accused, or some one of hisfriends, considered it advisable to have a copy specially printedfor the Emperor without the objectionable article. The Emperor didnot at first discover the trick, but shortly afterwards he receivedfrom London a polite note containing the article which had beenomitted, and informing him how he had been deceived.

But where were the Conservatives all this time? How came it thatfor two or three years no voice was raised and no protest made evenagainst the rhetorical exaggerations of the new-born liberalism?Where were the representatives of the old regime, who had been sothoroughly imbued with the spirit of Nicholas? Where were thoseministers who had systematically extinguished the least indicationof private initiative, those "satraps" who had stamped out theleast symptom of insubordination or discontent, those Press censorswho had diligently suppressed the mildest expression of liberalopinion, those thousands of well-intentioned proprietors who hadregarded as dangerous free-thinkers and treasonable republicans allwho ventured to express dissatisfaction with the existing state ofthings? A short time before, the Conservatives composed at leastnine-tenths of the upper classes, and now they had suddenly andmysteriously disappeared.

It is scarcely necessary to say that in a country accustomed topolitical life, such a sudden, unopposed revolution in publicopinion could not possibly take place. The key to the mystery liesin the fact that for centuries Russia had known nothing ofpolitical life or political parties. Those who were sometimescalled Conservatives were in reality not at all Conservatives inour sense of the term. If we say that they had a certain amount ofconservatism, we must add that it was of the latent, passive,unreasoned kind--the fruit of indolence and apathy. Theirpolitical creed had but one article: Thou shalt love the Tsar withall thy might, and carefully abstain from all resistance to hiswill--especially when it happens that the Tsar is a man of theNicholas type. So long as Nicholas lived they had passivelyacquiesced in his system--active acquiescence had been neitherdemanded nor desired--but when he died, the system of which he wasthe soul died with him. What then could they seek to defend? Theywere told that the system which they had been taught to regard asthe sheet-anchor of the State was in reality the chief cause of thenational disasters; and to this they could make no reply, becausethey had no better explanation of their own to offer. They wereconvinced that the Russian soldier was the best soldier in theworld, and they knew that in the recent war the army had not beenvictorious; the system, therefore, must be to blame. They weretold that a series of gigantic reforms was necessary in order torestore Russia to her proper place among the nations; and to thisthey could make no answer, for they had never studied such abstractquestions. And one thing they did know: that those who hesitatedto admit the necessity of gigantic reforms were branded by thePress as ignorant, narrow-minded, prejudiced, and egotistical, andwere held up to derision as men who did not know the mostelementary principles of political and economic science. Freelyexpressed public opinion was such a new phenomenon in Russia thatthe Press was able for some time to exercise a "Liberal" tyrannyscarcely less severe than the "Conservative" tyranny of the censorsin the preceding reign. Men who would have stood fire gallantly onthe field of battle quailed before the poisoned darts of Herzen inthe Kolokol. Under such circumstances, even the few who possessedsome vague Conservative convictions refrained from publiclyexpressing them.

The men who had played a more or less active part during thepreceding reign, and who might therefore be expected to haveclearer and deeper convictions, were specially incapable ofoffering opposition to the prevailing Liberal enthusiasm. TheirConservatism was of quite as limp a kind as that of the landedproprietors who were not in the public service, for under Nicholasthe higher a man was placed the less likely was he to havepolitical convictions of any kind outside the simple politicalcreed above referred to. Besides this, they belonged to that classwhich was for the moment under the anathema of public opinion, andthey had drawn direct personal advantage from the system which wasnow recognised as the chief cause of the national disasters.

For a time the name of tchinovnik became a term of reproach andderision, and the position of those who bore it was comicallypainful. They strove to prove that, though they held a post in thepublic service, they were entirely free from the tchinovnik spirit--that there was nothing of the genuine tchinovnik about them.Those who had formerly paraded their tchin (official rank) on alloccasions, in season and out of season, became half ashamed toadmit that they had the rank of General; for the title no longercommanded respect, and had become associated with all that wasantiquated, formal, and stupid. Among the young generation it wasused most disrespectfully as equivalent to "pompous blockhead."Zealous officials who had lately regarded the acquisition of Starsand Orders as among the chief ends of man, were fain to concealthose hard-won trophies, lest some cynical "Liberal" might noticethem and make them the butt of his satire. "Look at the depth ofhumiliation to which you have brought the country"--such was thechorus of reproach that was ever ringing in their ears--"with yourred tape, your Chinese formalism, and your principle of lifeless,unreasoning, mechanical obedience! You asserted constantly thatyou were the only true patriots, and branded with the name oftraitor those who warned you of the insane folly of your conduct.You see now what it has all come to. The men whom you helped tosend to the mines turn out to have been the true patriots."*

* It was a common saying at that time that nearly all the best menin Russia had spent a part of their lives in Siberia, and it wasproposed to publish a biographical dictionary of remarkable men, inwhich every article was to end thus: "Exiled to ---- in 18--." Iam not aware how far the project was seriously entertained, but, ofcourse, the book was never published.

And to these reproaches what could they reply? Like a child whohas in his frolics inadvertently set the house on fire, they couldonly look contrite, and say they did not mean it. They had simplyaccepted without criticism the existing order of things, and rangedthemselves among those who were officially recognised as "the well-intentioned." If they had always avoided the Liberals, and perhapshelped to persecute them, it was simply because all "well-intentioned" people said that Liberals were "restless" anddangerous to the State. Those who were not convinced of theirerrors simply kept silence, but the great majority passed over tothe ranks of the Progressists, and many endeavoured to redeem theirpast by showing extreme zeal for the Liberal cause.

In explanation of this extraordinary outburst of reform enthusiasm,we must further remember that the Russian educated classes, inspite of the severe northern climate which is supposed to make theblood circulate slowly, are extremely impulsive. They are fetteredby no venerable historical prejudices, and are wonderfullysensitive to the seductive influence of grandiose projects,especially when these excite the patriotic feelings. Then therewas the simple force of reaction--the rebound which naturallyfollowed the terrific compression of the preceding reign. Withoutdisrespect, the Russians of that time may be compared to schoolboyswho have just escaped from the rigorous discipline of a severeschoolmaster. In the first moments of freedom it was supposed thatthere would be no more discipline or compulsion. The utmostrespect was to be shown to "human dignity," and every Russian wasto act spontaneously and zealously at the great work of nationalregeneration. All thirsted for reforming activity. The men inauthority were inundated with projects of reform--some of themanonymous, and others from obscure individuals; some of thempractical, and very many wildly fantastic. Even the grammariansshowed their sympathy with the spirit of the time by proposing toexpel summarily all redundant letters from the Russian alphabet!

The fact that very few people had clear, precise ideas as to whatwas to be done did not prevent, but rather tended to increase, thereform enthusiasm. All had at least one common feeling--dislike towhat had previously existed. It was only when it became necessaryto forsake pure negation, and to create something, that theconceptions became clearer, and a variety of opinions appeared. Atthe first moment there was merely unanimity in negation, and animpulsive enthusiasm for beneficent reforms in general.

The first specific proposals were direct deductions from thelessons taught by the war. The war had shown in a terrible way thedisastrous consequences of having merely primitive means ofcommunication; the Press and the public began, accordingly, tospeak about the necessity of constructing railways, roads andriver-steamers. The war had shown that a country which has notdeveloped its natural resources very soon becomes exhausted if ithas to make a great national effort; accordingly the public and thePress talked about the necessity of developing the naturalresources, and about the means by which this desirable end might beattained. It had been shown by the war that a system of educationwhich tends to make men mere apathetic automata cannot produce evena good army; accordingly the public and the Press began to discussthe different systems of education and the numerous questions ofpedagogical science. It had been shown by the war that the bestintentions of a Government will necessarily be frustrated if themajority of the officials are dishonest or incapable; accordinglythe public and the Press began to speak about the paramountnecessity of reforming the Administration in all its branches.

It must not, however, be supposed that in thus laying to heart thelessons taught by the war and endeavouring to profit by them, theRussians were actuated by warlike feelings, and desired to avengethemselves as soon as possible on their victorious enemies. On thecontrary, the whole movement and the spirit which animated it wereeminently pacific. Prince Gortchakof's saying, "La Russie ne boudepas, elle se recueille," was more than a diplomatic repartee--itwas a true and graphic statement of the case. Though the Russiansare very inflammable, and can be very violent when their patrioticfeelings are aroused, they are, individually and as a nation,singularly free from rancour and the spirit of revenge. After thetermination of hostilities they really bore little malice towardsthe Western Powers, except towards Austria, which was believed tohave been treacherous and ungrateful to the country that had savedher in 1849. Their patriotism now took the form, not of revenge,but of a desire to raise their country to the level of the Westernnations. If they thought of military matters at all, they assumedthat military power would be obtained as a natural and inevitableresult of high civilisation and good government.

As a first step towards the realisation of the vast schemescontemplated, voluntary associations began to be formed forindustrial and commercial purposes, and a law was issued for thecreation of limited liability companies. In the space of two yearsforty-seven companies of this kind were founded, with a combinedcapital of 358 millions of roubles. To understand the fullsignificance of these figures, we must know that from the foundingof the first joint-stock company in 1799 down to 1853 only twenty-six companies had been formed, and their united capital amountedonly to thirty-two millions of roubles. Thus in the space of twoyears (1857-58) eleven times as much capital was subscribed tojoint-stock companies as had been subscribed during half a centuryprevious to the war. The most exaggerated expectations wereentertained as to the national and private advantages which mustnecessarily result from these undertakings, and it became apatriotic duty to subscribe liberally. The periodical literaturedepicted in glowing terms the marvellous results that had beenobtained in other countries by the principle of co-operation, andsanguine readers believed that they had discovered a patriotic wayof speedily becoming rich.

These were, however, mere secondary matters, and the public wereanxiously waiting for the Government to begin the grand reformingcampaign. When the educated classes awoke to the necessity ofgreat reforms, there was no clear conception as to how the greatwork should be undertaken. There was so much to be done that itwas no easy matter to decide what should be done first.Administrative, judicial, social, economical, financial, andpolitical reforms seemed all equally pressing. Gradually, however,it became evident that precedence must be given to the question ofserfage. It was absurd to speak about progress, humanitarianism,education, self-government, equality in the eye of the law, andsimilar matters, so long as one half of the population was excludedfrom the enjoyment of ordinary civil rights. So long as serfageexisted it was mere mockery to talk about re-organising Russiaaccording to the latest results of political and social science.How could a system of even-handed justice be introduced when twentymillions of the peasantry were subject to the arbitrary will of thelanded proprietors? How could agricultural or industrial progressbe made without free labour? How could the Government take activemeasures for the spread of national education when it had no directcontrol over one-half of the peasantry? Above all, how could it behoped that a great moral regeneration could take place, so long asthe nation voluntarily retained the stigma of serfage and slavery?

All this was very generally felt by the educated classes, but noone ventured to raise the question until it should be known whatwere the views of the Emperor on the subject. How the question wasgradually raised, how it was treated by the nobles, and how it wasultimately solved by the famous law of February 19th (March 3d),1861,* I now propose to relate.

* February 19th according to the old style, which is still used inRussia, and March 3d according to our method of reckoning.

CHAPTER XXVIII

THE SERFS

The Rural Population in Ancient Times--The Peasantry in theEighteenth Century--How Was This Change Effected?--The CommonExplanation Inaccurate--Serfage the Result of Permanent Economicand Political Causes--Origin of the Adscriptio Glebae--ItsConsequences--Serf Insurrection--Turning-point in the History ofSerfage--Serfage in Russia and in Western Europe--State Peasants--Numbers and Geographical Distribution of the Serf Population--SerfDues--Legal and Actual Power of the Proprietors--The Serfs' Meansof Defence--Fugitives--Domestic Serfs--Strange Advertisements inthe Moscow Gazette--Moral Influence of Serfage.

Before proceeding to describe the Emancipation, it may be well toexplain briefly how the Russian peasants became serfs, and whatserfage in Russia really was.

In the earliest period of Russian history the rural population wascomposed of three distinct classes. At the bottom of the scalestood the slaves, who were very numerous. Their numbers werecontinually augmented by prisoners of war, by freemen whovoluntarily sold themselves as slaves, by insolvent debtors, and bycertain categories of criminals. Immediately above the slaves werethe free agricultural labourers, who had no permanent domicile, butwandered about the country and settled temporarily where theyhappened to find work and satisfactory remuneration. In the thirdplace, distinct from these two classes, and in some respects higherin the social scale, were the peasants properly so called.*

* My chief authority for the early history of the peasantry hasbeen Belaef, "Krestyanye na Rusi," Moscow, 1860; a most able andconscientious work.

These peasants proper, who may be roughly described as smallfarmers or cottiers, were distinguished from the free agriculturallabourers in two respects: they were possessors of land in propertyor usufruct, and they were members of a rural Commune. TheCommunes were free primitive corporations which elected theiroffice-bearers from among the heads of families, and sent delegatesto act as judges or assessors in the Prince's Court. Some of theCommunes possessed land of their own, whilst others were settled onthe estates of the landed proprietors or on the extensive domainsof the monasteries. In the latter case the peasant paid a fixedyearly rent in money, in produce, or in labour, according to theterms of his contract with the proprietor or the monastery; but hedid not thereby sacrifice in any way his personal liberty. As soonas he had fulfilled the engagements stipulated in the contract andhad settled accounts with the owner of the land, he was free tochange his domicile as he pleased.

If we turn now from these early times to the eighteenth century, wefind that the position of the rural population has entirely changedin the interval. The distinction between slaves, agriculturallabourers, and peasants has completely disappeared. All threecategories have melted together into a common class, called serfs,who are regarded as the property of the landed proprietors or ofthe State. "The proprietors sell their peasants and domesticservants not even in families, but one by one, like cattle, as isdone nowhere else in the whole world, from which practice there isnot a little wailing."* And yet the Government, whilst professingto regret the existence of the practice, takes no energeticmeasures to prevent it. On the contrary, it deprives the serfs ofall legal protection, and expressly commands that if any serf shalldare to present a petition against his master, he shall be punishedwith the knout and transported for life to the mines of Nertchinsk.(Ukaz of August 22d, 1767.**)

* These words are taken from an Imperial ukaz of April 15th, 1721.Polnoye Sobranye Zakonov, No. 3,770.

** This is an ukaz of the liberal and tolerant Catherine! How shereconciled it with her respect and admiration for Beccaria's humaneviews on criminal law she does not explain.

How did this important change take place, and how is it to beexplained?

If we ask any educated Russian who has never specially occupiedhimself with historical investigations regarding the origin ofserfage in Russia, he will probably reply somewhat in this fashion:

"In Russia slavery has never existed (!), and even serfage in theWest-European sense has never been recognised by law! In ancienttimes the rural population was completely free, and every peasantmight change his domicile on St. George's Day--that is to say, atthe end of the agricultural year. This right of migration wasabolished by Tsar Boris Godunof--who, by the way, was half a Tartarand more than half a usurper--and herein lies the essence ofserfage in the Russian sense. The peasants have never been theproperty of the landed proprietors, but have always been personallyfree; and the only legal restriction on their liberty was that theywere not allowed to change their domicile without the permission ofthe proprietor. If so-called serfs were sometimes sold, thepractice was simply an abuse not justified by legislation."

This simple explanation, in which may be detected a note ofpatriotic pride, is almost universally accepted in Russia; but itcontains, like most popular conceptions of the distant past, acurious mixture of fact and fiction. Serious historicalinvestigation tends to show that the power of the proprietors overthe peasants came into existence, not suddenly, as the result of anukaz, but gradually, as a consequence of permanent economic andpolitical causes, and that Boris Godunof was not more to blame thanmany of his predecessors and successors.*

* See especially Pobedonostsef, in the Russki Vestnik, 1858, No.11, and "Istoritcheskiya izsledovaniya i statyi" (St. Petersburg,1876), by the same author; also Pogodin, in the Russkaya Beseda,1858, No. 4.

Although the peasants in ancient Russia were free to wander aboutas they chose, there appeared at a very early period--long beforethe reign of Boris Godunof--a decided tendency in the Princes, inthe proprietors, and in the Communes, to prevent migration. Thistendency will be easily understood if we remember that land withoutlabourers is useless, and that in Russia at that time thepopulation was small in comparison with the amount of reclaimed andeasily reclaimable land. The Prince desired to have as manyinhabitants as possible in his principality, because the amount ofhis regular revenues depended on the number of the population. Thelanded proprietor desired to have as many peasants as possible onhis estate, to till for him the land which he reserved for his ownuse, and to pay him for the remainder a yearly rent in money,produce, or labour. The free Communes desired to have a number ofmembers sufficient to keep the whole of the Communal land undercultivation, because each Commune had to pay yearly to the Prince afixed sum in money or agricultural produce, and the greater thenumber of able-bodied members, the less each individual had to pay.To use the language of political economy, the Princes, the landedproprietors, and the free Communes all appeared as buyers in thelabour market; and the demand was far in excess of the supply.Nowadays when young colonies or landed proprietors in an outlyingcorner of the world are similarly in need of labour, they seek tosupply the want by organising a regular system of importinglabourers--using illegal violent means, such as kidnappingexpeditions, merely as an exceptional expedient. In old Russia anysuch regularly organised system was impossible, and consequentlyillegal or violent measures were not the exception, but the rule.The chief practical advantage of the frequent military expeditionsfor those who took part in them was the acquisition of prisoners ofwar, who were commonly transformed into slaves by their captors.If it be true, as some assert, that only unbaptised prisoners werelegally considered lawful booty, it is certain that in practice,before the unification of the principalities under the Tsars ofMoscow, little distinction was made in this respect betweenunbaptised foreigners and Orthodox Russians.* A similar method wassometimes employed for the acquisition of free peasants: the morepowerful proprietors organised kidnapping expeditions, and carriedoff by force the peasants settled on the land of their weakerneighbours.

Under these circumstances it was only natural that those whopossessed this valuable commodity should do all in their power tokeep it. Many, if not all, of the free Communes adopted the simplemeasure of refusing to allow a member to depart until he had foundsome one to take his place. The proprietors never, so far as weknow, laid down formally such a principle, but in practice they didall in their power to retain the peasants actually settled on theirestates. For this purpose some simply employed force, whilstothers acted under cover of legal formalities. The peasant whoaccepted land from a proprietor rarely brought with him thenecessary implements, cattle, and capital to begin at once hisoccupations, and to feed himself and his family till the ensuingharvest. He was obliged, therefore, to borrow from his landlord,and the debt thus contracted was easily converted into a means ofpreventing his departure if he wished to change his domicile. Weneed not enter into further details. The proprietors were thecapitalists of the time. Frequent bad harvests, plagues, fires,military raids, and similar misfortunes often reduced evenprosperous peasants to beggary. The muzhik was probably then, asnow, only too ready to accept a loan without taking the necessaryprecautions for repaying it. The laws relating to debt wereterribly severe, and there was no powerful judicial organisation toprotect the weak. If we remember all this, we shall not besurprised to learn that a considerable part of the peasantry werepractically serfs before serfage was recognised by law.

So long as the country was broken up into independentprincipalities, and each land-owner was almost an independentPrince on his estate, the peasants easily found a remedy for theseabuses in flight. They fled to a neighbouring proprietor who couldprotect them from their former landlord and his claims, or theytook refuge in a neighbouring principality, where they were, ofcourse, still safer. All this was changed when the independentprincipalities were transformed into the Tsardom of Muscovy. TheTsars had new reasons for opposing the migration of the peasantsand new means for preventing it. The old Princes had simply givengrants of land to those who served them, and left the grantee to dowith his land what seemed good to him; the Tsars, on the contrary,gave to those who served them merely the usufruct of a certainquantity of land, and carefully proportioned the quantity to therank and the obligations of the receiver. In this change there wasplainly a new reason for fixing the peasants to the soil. The realvalue of a grant depended not so much on the amount of land as onthe number of peasants settled on it, and hence any migration ofthe population was tantamount to a removal of the ancientlandmarks--that is to say, to a disturbance of the arrangementsmade by the Tsar. Suppose, for instance, that the Tsar granted toa Boyar or some lesser dignitary an estate on which were settledtwenty peasant families, and that afterwards ten of these emigratedto neighbouring proprietors. In this case the recipient mightjustly complain that he had lost half of his estate--though theamount of land was in no way diminished--and that he wasconsequently unable to fulfil his obligations. Such complaintswould be rarely, if ever, made by the great dignitaries, for theyhad the means of attracting peasants to their estates;* but thesmall proprietors had good reason to complain, and the Tsar wasbound to remove their grievances. The attaching of the peasants tothe soil was, in fact, the natural consequence of feudal tenures--an integral part of the Muscovite political system. The Tsarcompelled the nobles to serve him, and was unable to pay them inmoney. He was obliged, therefore, to procure for them some othermeans of livelihood. Evidently the simplest method of solving thedifficulty was to give them land, with a certain number oflabourers, and to prevent the labourers from migrating.

* There are plain indications in the documents of the time that thegreat dignitaries were at first hostile to the adscriptio glebae.We find a similar phenomenon at a much more recent date in LittleRussia. Long after serfage had been legalised in that region byCatherine II., the great proprietors, such as Rumyantsef,Razumofski, Bezborodko, continued to attract to their estates thepeasants of the smaller proprietors. See the article of Pogodin inthe Russkaya Beseda, 1858, No. 4, p. 154.

Towards the free Communes the Tsar had to act in the same way forsimilar reasons. The Communes, like the nobles, had obligations tothe Sovereign, and could not fulfil them if the peasants wereallowed to migrate from one locality to another. They were, in acertain sense, the property of the Tsar, and it was only naturalthat the Tsar should do for himself what he had done for hisnobles.

With these new reasons for fixing the peasants to the soil came, ashas been said, new means of preventing migration. Formerly it wasan easy matter to flee to a neighbouring principality, but now allthe principalities were combined under one ruler, and thefoundations of a centralised administration were laid. Severefugitive laws were issued against those who attempted to changetheir domicile and against the proprietors who should harbour therunaways. Unless the peasant chose to face the difficulties of"squatting" in the inhospitable northern forests, or resolved tobrave the dangers of the steppe, he could nowhere escape the heavyhand of Moscow.*

* The above account of the origin of serfage in Russia is foundedon a careful examination of the evidence which we possess on thesubject, but I must not conceal the fact that some of thestatements are founded on inference rather than on direct,unequivocal documentary evidence. The whole question is one ofgreat difficulty, and will in all probability not be satisfactorilysolved until a large number of the old local Land-Registers(Pistsoviya Knigi) have been published and carefully studied.

The indirect consequences of thus attaching the peasants to thesoil did not at once become apparent. The serf retained all thecivil rights he had hitherto enjoyed, except that of changing hisdomicile. He could still appear before the courts of law as a freeman, freely engage in trade or industry, enter into all manner ofcontracts, and rent land for cultivation.

But as time wore on, the change in the legal relation between thetwo classes became apparent in real life. In attaching thepeasantry to the soil, the Government had been so thoroughlyengrossed with the direct financial aim that it entirelyoverlooked, or wilfully shut its eyes to, the ulterior consequenceswhich must necessarily flow from the policy it adopted. It wasevident that as soon as the relation between proprietor and peasantwas removed from the region of voluntary contract by being renderedindissoluble, the weaker of the two parties legally tied togethermust fall completely under the power of the stronger, unlessenergetically protected by the law and the Administration. To thisinevitable consequence the Government paid no attention. So farfrom endeavouring to protect the peasantry from the oppression ofthe proprietors, it did not even determine by law the mutualobligations which ought to exist between the two classes. Takingadvantage of this omission, the proprietors soon began to imposewhatever obligations they thought fit; and as they had no legalmeans of enforcing fulfilment, they gradually introduced apatriarchal jurisdiction similar to that which they exercised overtheir slaves, with fines and corporal punishment as means ofcoercion. From this they ere long proceeded a step further, andbegan to sell their peasants without the land on which they weresettled. At first this was merely a flagrant abuse unsanctioned bylaw, for the peasant had never been declared the private propertyof the landed proprietor; but the Government tacitly sanctioned thepractice, and even exacted dues on such sales, as on the sale ofslaves. Finally the right to sell peasants without land wasformally recognised by various Imperial ukazes.*

* For instance, the ukazes of October 13th, 1675, and June 25th,1682. See Belaef, pp. 203-209.

The old Communal organisation still existed on the estates of theproprietors, and had never been legally deprived of its authority,but it was now powerless to protect the members. The proprietorcould easily overcome any active resistance by selling orconverting into domestic servants the peasants who dared to opposehis will.

The peasantry had thus sunk to the condition of serfs, practicallydeprived of legal protection and subject to the arbitrary will ofthe proprietors; but they were still in some respects legally andactually distinguished from the slaves on the one hand and the"free wandering people" on the other. These distinctions wereobliterated by Peter the Great and his immediate successors.

To effect his great civil and military reforms, Peter required anannual revenue such as his predecessors had never dreamed of, andhe was consequently always on the look-out for some new object oftaxation. When looking about for this purpose, his eye naturallyfell on the slaves, the domestic servants, and the freeagricultural labourers. None of these classes paid taxes--a factwhich stood in flagrant contradiction with his fundamentalprinciple of polity, that every subject should in some way servethe State. He caused, therefore, a national census to be taken, inwhich all the various classes of the rural population--slaves,domestic servants, agricultural labourers, peasants--should beinscribed in one category; and he imposed equally on all themembers of this category a poll-tax, in lieu of the former land-tax, which had lain exclusively on the peasants. To facilitate thecollection of this tax the proprietors were made responsible fortheir serfs; and the "free wandering people" who did not wish toenter the army were ordered, under pain of being sent to thegalleys, to inscribe themselves as members of a Commune or as serfsto some proprietor.

These measures had a considerable influence, if not on the actualposition of the peasantry, at least on the legal conceptionsregarding them. By making the proprietor pay the poll-tax for hisserfs, as if they were slaves or cattle, the law seemed to sanctionthe idea that they were part of his goods and chattels. Besidesthis, it introduced the entirely new principle that any member ofthe rural population not legally attached to the land or to aproprietor should be regarded as a vagrant, and treatedaccordingly. Thus the principle that every subject should in someway serve the State had found its complete realisation. There wasno longer any room in Russia for free men.

The change in the position of the peasantry, together with thehardships and oppression by which it was accompanied, naturallyincreased fugitivism and vagrancy. Thousands of serfs ran awayfrom their masters and fled to the steppe or sought enrolment inthe army. To prevent this the Government considered it necessaryto take severe and energetic measures. The serfs were forbidden toenlist without the permission of their masters, and those whopersisted in presenting themselves for enrolment were to be beaten"cruelly" (zhestoko) with the knout, and sent to the mines.* Theproprietors, on the other hand, received the right to transportwithout trial their unruly serfs to Siberia, and even to send themto the mines for life.**

* Ukaz of June 2d, 1742.

** See ukaz of January 17th, 1765, and of January 28th, 1766.

If these stringent measures had any effect it was not of longduration, for there soon appeared among the serfs a still strongerspirit of discontent and insubordination, which threatened toproduce a general agrarian rising, and actually did create amovement resembling in many respects the Jacquerie in France andthe Peasant War in Germany. A glance at the causes of thismovement will help us to understand the real nature of serfage inRussia.

Up to this point serfage had, in spite of its flagrant abuses, acertain theoretical justification. It was, as we have seen, merelya part of a general political system in which obligatory servicewas imposed on all classes of the population. The serfs served thenobles in order that the nobles might serve the Tsar. In 1762 thistheory was entirely overturned by a manifesto of Peter III.abolishing the obligatory service of the Noblesse. According tostrict justice this act ought to have been followed by theliberation of the serfs, for if the nobles were no longer obligedto serve the State they had no just claim to the service of thepeasants. The Government had so completely forgotten the originalmeaning of serfage that it never thought of carrying out themeasure to its logical consequences, but the peasantry heldtenaciously to the ancient conceptions, and looked impatiently fora second manifesto liberating them from the power of theproprietors. Reports were spread that such a manifesto reallyexisted, and was being concealed by the nobles. A spirit ofinsubordination accordingly appeared among the rural population,and local insurrections broke out in several parts of the Empire.

At this critical moment Peter III. was dethroned and assassinatedby a Court conspiracy. The peasants, who, of course, knew nothingof the real motives of the conspirators, supposed that the Tsar hadbeen assassinated by those who wished to preserve serfage, andbelieved him to be a martyr in the cause of Emancipation. At thenews of the catastrophe their hopes of Emancipation fell, but soonthey were revived by new rumours. The Tsar, it was said, hadescaped from the conspirators and was in hiding. Soon he wouldappear among his faithful peasants, and with their aid would regainhis throne and punish the wicked oppressors. Anxiously he wasawaited, and at last the glad tidings came that he had appeared inthe Don country, that thousands of Cossacks had joined hisstandard, that he was everywhere putting the proprietors to deathwithout mercy, and that he would soon arrive in the ancientcapital!

Peter III. was in reality in his grave, but there was a terribleelement of truth in these reports. A pretender, a Cossack calledPugatchef, had really appeared on the Don, and had assumed the rolewhich the peasants expected the late Tsar to play. Advancingthrough the country of the Lower Volga, he took several places ofimportance, put to death all the proprietors he could find,defeated on more than one occasion the troops sent against him, andthreatened to advance into the heart of the Empire. It seemed asif the old troublous times were about to be renewed--as if thecountry was once more to be pillaged by those wild Cossacks of thesouthern steppe. But the pretender showed himself incapable ofplaying the part he had assumed. His inhuman cruelty estrangedmany who would otherwise have followed him, and he was toodeficient in decision and energy to take advantage of favourablecircumstances. If it be true that he conceived the idea ofcreating a peasant empire (muzhitskoe tsarstvo), he was not the manto realise such a scheme. After a series of mistakes and defeatshe was taken prisoner, and the insurrection was quelled.*

*Whilst living among the Bashkirs of the province of Samara in 1872I found some interesting traditions regarding this pretender.Though nearly a century had elapsed since his death (1775), hisname, his personal appearance, and his exploits were well knowneven to the younger generation. My informants firmly believed thathe was not an impostor, but the genuine Tsar, dethroned by hisambitious consort, and that he never was taken prisoner, but "wentaway into foreign lands." When I asked whether he was still alive,and whether he might not one day return, they replied that they didnot know.

Meanwhile Peter III. had been succeeded by his consort, CatherineII. As she had no legal right to the throne, and was by birth aforeigner, she could not gain the affections of the people, and wasobliged to court the favour of the Noblesse. In such a difficultposition she could not venture to apply her humane principles tothe question of serfage. Even during the first years of her reign,when she had no reason to fear agrarian disturbances, she increasedrather than diminished the power of the proprietors over theirserfs, and the Pugatchef affair confirmed her in this line ofpolicy. During her reign serfage may be said to have reached itsclimax. The serfs were regarded by the law as part of the master'simmovable property*--as part of the working capital of the estate--and as such they were bought, sold, and given as presents** inhundreds and thousands, sometimes with the land, and sometimeswithout it, sometimes in families, and sometimes individually. Theonly legal restriction was that they should not be offered for saleat the time of the conscription, and that they should at no time besold publicly by auction, because such a custom was considered as"unbecoming in a European State." In all other respects the serfsmight be treated as private property; and this view is to be foundnot only in the legislation, but also in the popular conceptions.It became customary--a custom that continued down to the year 1861--to compute a noble's fortune, not by his yearly revenue or theextent of his estate, but by the number of his serfs. Instead ofsaying that a man had so many hundreds or thousands a year, or somany acres, it was commonly said that he had so many hundreds orthousands of "souls." And over these "souls" he exercised the mostunlimited authority. The serfs had no legal means of self-defence.The Government feared that the granting to them of judicial oradministrative protection would inevitably awaken in them a spiritof insubordination, and hence it was ordered that those whopresented complaints should be punished with the knout and sent tothe mines.*** It was only in extreme cases, when some instance ofatrocious cruelty happened to reach the ears of the Sovereign, thatthe authorities interfered with the proprietor's jurisdiction, andthese cases had not the slightest influence on the proprietors ingeneral.****

* See ukaz of October 7th, 1792.

** As an example of making presents of serfs, the following may becited. Count Panin presented some of his subordinates for anImperial recompense, and on receiving a refusal, made them apresent of 4000 serfs from his own estates.--Belaef, p. 320.

*** See the ukazes of August 22d, 1767, and March 30th, 1781.

**** Perhaps the most horrible case on record is that of a certainlady called Saltykof, who was brought to justice in 1768.According to the ukaz regarding her crimes, she had killed byinhuman tortures in the course of ten or eleven years about ahundred of her serfs, chiefly of the female sex, and among themseveral young girls of eleven and twelve years of age. Accordingto popular belief her cruelty proceeded from cannibal propensities,but this was not confirmed by the judicial investigation. Detailsin the Russki Arkhiv, 1865, pp. 644-652. The atrocities practisedon the estate of Count Araktcheyef, the favourite of Alexander I.at the commencement of last century, have been frequentlydescribed, and are scarcely less revolting.

The last years of the eighteenth century may be regarded as theturning-point in the history of serfage. Up till that time thepower of the proprietors had steadily increased, and the area ofserfage had rapidly expanded. Under the Emperor Paul (1796-1801)we find the first decided symptoms of a reaction. He regarded theproprietors as his most efficient officers of police, but hedesired to limit their authority, and for this purpose issued anukaz to the effect that the serfs should not be forced to work fortheir masters more than three days in the week. With the accessionof Alexander I., in 1801, commenced a long series of abortiveprojects for a general emancipation, and endless attempts tocorrect the more glaring abuses; and during the reign of Nicholasno less than six committees were formed at different times toconsider the question. But the practical result of these effortswas extremely small. The custom of giving grants of land withpeasants was abolished; certain slight restrictions were placed onthe authority of the proprietors; a number of the worst specimensof the class were removed from the administration of their estates;a few who were convicted of atrocious cruelty were exiled toSiberia;* and some thousands of serfs were actually emancipated;but no decisive radical measures were attempted, and the serfs didnot receive even the right of making formal complaints. Serfagehad, in fact, come to be regarded as a vital part of the Stateorganisation, and the only sure basis for autocracy. It wastherefore treated tenderly, and the rights and protection accordedby various ukazes were almost entirely illusory.

*Speranski, for instance, when Governor of the province of Penza,brought to justice, among others, a proprietor who had caused oneof his serfs to be flogged to death, and a lady who had murdered aserf boy by pricking him with a pen-knife because he had neglectedto take proper care of a tame rabbit committed to his charge!--Korff, "Zhizn Speranskago," II., p. 127, note.

If we compare the development of serfage in Russia and in WesternEurope, we find very many points in common, but in Russia themovement had certain peculiarities. One of the most important ofthese was caused by the rapid development of the Autocratic Power.In feudal Europe, where there was no strong central authority tocontrol the Noblesse, the free rural Communes entirely, or almostentirely, disappeared. They were either appropriated by the noblesor voluntarily submitted to powerful landed proprietors or tomonasteries, and in this way the whole of the reclaimed land, witha few rare exceptions, became the property of the nobles or of theChurch. In Russia we find the same movement, but it was arrestedby the Imperial power before all the land had been appropriated.The nobles could reduce to serfage the peasants settled on theirestates, but they could not take possession of the free Communes,because such an appropriation would have infringed the rights anddiminished the revenues of the Tsar. Down to the commencement ofthe last century, it is true, large grants of land with serfs weremade to favoured individuals among the Noblesse, and in the reignof Paul (1796-1801) a considerable number of estates were affectedto the use of the Imperial family under the name of appanages(Udyelniya imteniya); but on the other hand, the extensive Churchlands, when secularised by Catherine II., were not distributedamong the nobles, as in many other countries, but were transformedinto State Domains. Thus, at the date of the Emancipation (1861),by far the greater part of the territory belonged to the State, andone-half of the rural population were so-called State Peasants(Gosudarstvenniye krestyanye).

Regarding the condition of these State Peasants, or Peasants of theDomains, as they are sometimes called, I may say briefly that theywere, in a certain sense, serfs, being attached to the soil likethe others; but their condition was, as a rule, somewhat betterthan the serfs in the narrower acceptation of the term. They hadto suffer much from the tyranny and extortion of the specialadministration under which they lived, but they had more land andmore liberty than was commonly enjoyed on the estates of residentproprietors, and their position was much less precarious. It isoften asserted that the officials of the Domains were worse thanthe serf-owners, because they had not the same interest in theprosperity of the peasantry; but this a priori reasoning does notstand the test of experience.

It is not a little interesting to observe the numerical proportionand geographical distribution of these two rural classes. InEuropean Russia, as a whole, about three-eighths of the populationwere composed of serfs belonging to the nobles;* but if we take theprovinces separately we find great variations from this average.In five provinces the serfs were less than three per cent., whilein others they formed more than seventy per cent. of thepopulation! This is not an accidental phenomenon. In thegeographical distribution of serfage we can see reflected theorigin and history of the institution.

* The exact numbers, according to official data, were--

Entire Population 60,909,309Peasantry of all Classes 49,486,665

Of these latter there were--

State Peasants 23,138,191Peasants on the Lands of Proprietors 23,022,390Peasants of the Appanages and other Departments 3,326,084 ---------- 49,486,665

If we were to construct a map showing the geographical distributionof the serf population, we should at once perceive that serfageradiated from Moscow. Starting from that city as a centre andtravelling in any direction towards the confines of the Empire, wefind that, after making allowance for a few disturbing localinfluences, the proportion of serfs regularly declines in thesuccessive provinces traversed. In the region representing the oldMuscovite Tsardom they form considerably more than a half of therural population. Immediately to the south and east of this, inthe territory that was gradually annexed during the seventeenth andfirst half of the eighteenth century, the proportion varies fromtwenty-five to fifty per cent., and in the more recently annexedprovinces it steadily decreases till it almost reaches zero.

We may perceive, too, that the percentage of serfs decreasestowards the north much more rapidly than towards the east andsouth. This points to the essentially agricultural nature ofserfage in its infancy. In the south and east there was abundanceof rich "black earth" celebrated for its fertility, and the noblesin quest of estates naturally preferred this region to theinhospitable north, with its poor soil and severe climate.

A more careful examination of the supposed map* would bring outother interesting facts. Let me notice one by way of illustration.Had serfage been the result of conquest we should have found theSlavonic race settled on the State Domains, and the Finnish andTartar tribes supplying the serfs of the nobles. In reality wefind quite the reverse; the Finns and Tartars were nearly all StatePeasants, and the serfs of the proprietors were nearly all ofSlavonic race. This is to be accounted for by the fact that theFinnish and Tartar tribes inhabit chiefly the outlying regions, inwhich serfage never attained such dimensions as in the centre ofthe Empire.

* Such a map was actually constructed by Troinitski ("KrepostnoeNaseleniye v Rossii," St. Petersburg, 1861), but it is not nearlyso graphic as is might have been.

The dues paid by the serfs were of three kinds: labour, money, andfarm produce. The last-named is so unimportant that it may bedismissed in a few words. It consisted chiefly of eggs, chickens,lambs, mushrooms, wild berries, and linen cloth. The amount ofthese various products depended entirely on the will of the master.The other two kinds of dues, as more important, we must examinemore closely.

When a proprietor had abundance of fertile land and wished to farmon his own account, he commonly demanded from his serfs as muchlabour as possible. Under such a master the serfs were probablyfree from money dues, and fulfilled their obligations to him bylabouring in his fields in summer and transporting his grain tomarket in winter. When, on the contrary, a land-owner had moreserf labour at his disposal than he required for the cultivation ofhis fields, he put the superfluous serfs "on obrok,"--that is tosay, he allowed them to go and work where they pleased on conditionof paying him a fixed yearly sum. Sometimes the proprietor did notfarm at all on his own account, in which case he put all the serfs"on obrok," and generally gave to the Commune in usufruct the wholeof the arable land and pasturage. In this way the Mir played thepart of a tenant.

We have here the basis for a simple and important classification ofestates in the time of serfage: (1) Estates on which the dues wereexclusively in labour; (2) estates on which the dues were partly inlabour and partly in money; and (3) estates on which the dues wereexclusively in money.

In the manner of exacting the labour dues there was considerablevariety. According to the famous manifesto of Paul I., the peasantcould not be compelled to work more than three days in the week;but this law was by no means universally observed, and those whodid observe it had various methods of applying it. A few took itliterally and laid down a rule that the serfs should work for themthree definite days in the week--for example, every Monday,Tuesday, and Wednesday--but this was an extremely inconvenientmethod, for it prevented the field labour from being carried onregularly. A much more rational system was that according to whichone-half of the serfs worked the first three days of the week, andthe other half the remaining three. In this way there was, withoutany contravention of the law, a regular and constant supply oflabour. It seems, however, that the great majority of theproprietors followed no strict method, and paid no attentionwhatever to Paul's manifesto, which gave to the peasants no legalmeans of making formal complaints. They simply summoned daily asmany labourers as they required. The evil consequences of this forthe peasants' crops were in part counteracted by making thepeasants sow their own grain a little later than that of theproprietor, so that the master's harvest work was finished, ornearly finished, before their grain was ripe. This combination didnot, however, always succeed, and in cases where there was aconflict of interests, the serf was, of course, the losing party.All that remained for him to do in such cases was to work a littlein his own fields before six o'clock in the morning and after nineo'clock at night, and in order to render this possible heeconomised his strength, and worked as little as possible in hismaster's fields during the day.

It has frequently been remarked, and with much truth--though theindiscriminate application of the principle has often led tounjustifiable legislative inactivity--that the practical result ofinstitutions depends less on the intrinsic abstract nature of theinstitutions themselves than on the character of those who workthem. So it was with serfage. When a proprietor habitually actedtowards his serfs in an enlightened, rational, humane way, they hadlittle reason to complain of their position, and their life wasmuch easier than that of many men who live in a state of completeindividual freedom and unlimited, unrestricted competition.However paradoxical the statement may seem to those who are in thehabit of regarding all forms of slavery from the sentimental pointof view, it is unquestionable that the condition of serfs undersuch a proprietor as I have supposed was more enviable than that ofthe majority of English agricultural labourers. Each family had ahouse of its own, with a cabbage-garden, one or more horses, one ortwo cows, several sheep, poultry, agricultural implements, a shareof the Communal land, and everything else necessary for carrying onits small farming operations; and in return for this it had tosupply the proprietor with an amount of labour which was by nomeans oppressive. If, for instance, a serf had three adult sons--and the households, as I have said, were at that time generallynumerous--two of them might work for the proprietor whilst hehimself and the remaining son could attend exclusively to thefamily affairs. By the events which used to be called "thevisitations of God" he had no fear of being permanently ruined. Ifhis house was burnt, or his cattle died from the plague, or aseries of "bad years" left him without seed for his fields, hecould always count upon temporary assistance from his master. Hewas protected, too, against all oppression and exactions on thepart of the officials; for the police, when there was any call forits interference, applied to the proprietor, who was to a certainextent responsible for his serfs. Thus the serf might live atranquil, contented life, and die at a ripe old age, without everhaving been conscious that serfage was a grievous burden.

If all the serfs had lived in this way we might, perhaps, regretthat the Emancipation was ever undertaken. In reality there was,as the French say, le revers de la medaille, and serfage generallyappeared under a form very different from that which I have justdepicted. The proprietors were, unfortunately, not all of theenlightened, humane type. Amongst them were many who demanded fromtheir serfs an inordinate amount of labour, and treated them in avery inhuman fashion.

These oppressors of their serfs may be divided into fourcategories. First, there were the proprietors who managed theirown estates, and oppressed simply for the purpose of increasingtheir revenues. Secondly, there were a number of retired officerswho wished to establish a certain order and discipline on theirestates, and who employed for this purpose the barbarous measureswhich were at that time used in the army, believing that mercilesscorporal punishment was the only means of curing laziness,disorderliness and other vices. Thirdly, there were the absenteeswho lived beyond their means, and demanded from their steward,under pain of giving him or his son as a recruit, a much greateryearly sum than the estate could be reasonably expected to yield.Lastly, in the latter years of serfage, there were a number of menwho bought estates as a mercantile speculation, and made as muchmoney out of them as they could in the shortest possible space oftime.

Of all hard masters, the last-named were the most terrible.Utterly indifferent to the welfare of the serfs and the ultimatefate of the property, they cut down the timber, sold the cattle,exacted heavy money dues under threats of giving the serfs or theirchildren as recruits, presented to the military authorities anumber of conscripts greater than was required by law--selling theconscription receipts (zatchetniya kvitantsii) to the merchants andburghers who were liable to the conscription but did not wish toserve--compelled some of the richer serfs to buy their liberty atan enormous price, and, in a word, used every means, legal andillegal, for extracting money. By this system of management theyruined the estate completely in the course of a few years; but bythat time they had realised probably the whole sum paid, with avery fair profit from the operation; and this profit could beconsiderably augmented by selling a number of the peasant familiesfor transportation to another estate (na svoz), or by mortgagingthe property in the Opekunski Sovet--a Government institution whichlent money on landed property without examining carefully thenature of the security.

As to the means which the proprietors possessed of oppressing theirpeasants, we must distinguish between the legal and the actual.The legal were almost as complete as any one could desire. "Theproprietor," it is said in the Laws (Vol. IX, p. 1045, ed. an.1857), "may impose on his serfs every kind of labour, may take fromthem money dues (obrok) and demand from them personal service, withthis one restriction, that they should not be thereby ruined, andthat the number of days fixed by law should be left to them fortheir own work."* Besides this, he had the right to transformpeasants into domestic servants, and might, instead of employingthem in his own service, hire them out to others who had the rightsand privileges of Noblesse (pp. 1047-48). For all offencescommitted against himself or against any one under his jurisdictionhe could subject the guilty ones to corporal punishment notexceeding forty lashes with the birch or fifteen blows with thestick (p. 1052); and if he considered any of his serfs asincorrigible, he could present them to the authorities to bedrafted into the army or transported to Siberia as he might desire(pp. 1053-55). In cases of insubordination, where the ordinarydomestic means of discipline did not suffice, he could call in thepolice and the military to support his authority.

* I give here the references to the Code, because Russians commonlybelieve and assert that the hiring out of serfs, the infliction ofcorporal punishment, and similar practices were merely abusesunauthorised by law.

Such were the legal means by which the proprietor might oppress hispeasants, and it will be readily understood that they were veryconsiderable and very elastic. By law he had the power to imposeany dues in labour or money which he might think fit, and in allcases the serfs were ordered to be docile and obedient (p. 1027).Corporal punishment, though restricted by law, he could in realityapply to any extent. Certainly none of the serfs, and very few ofthe proprietors, were aware that the law placed any restriction onthis right. All the proprietors were in the habit of usingcorporal punishment as they thought proper, and unless a proprietorbecame notorious for inhuman cruelty the authorities never thoughtof interfering. But in the eyes of the peasants corporalpunishment was not the worst. What they feared infinitely morethan the birch or the stick was the proprietor's power of givingthem or their sons as recruits. The law assumed that this extrememeans would be employed only against those serfs who showedthemselves incorrigibly vicious or insubordinate; but theauthorities accepted those presented without making anyinvestigations, and consequently the proprietor might use thispower as an effective means of extortion.

Against these means of extortion and oppression the serfs had nolegal protection. The law provided them with no means of resistingany injustice to which they might be subjected, or of bringing topunishment the master who oppressed and ruined them. TheGovernment, notwithstanding its sincere desire to protect them frominordinate burdens and cruel treatment, rarely interfered betweenthe master and his serfs, being afraid of thereby undermining theauthority of the proprietors, and awakening among the peasantry aspirit of insubordination. The serfs were left, therefore, totheir own resources, and had to defend themselves as best theycould. The simplest way was open mutiny; but this was rarelyemployed, for they knew by experience that any attempt of the kindwould be at once put down by the military and mercilessly punished.Much more favourite and efficient methods were passive resistance,flight, and fire-raising or murder.

We might naturally suppose that an unscrupulous proprietor, armedwith the enormous legal and actual power which I have justdescribed, could very easily extort from his peasants anything hedesired. In reality, however, the process of extortion, when itexceeded a certain measure, was a very difficult operation. TheRussian peasant has a capacity of patient endurance that would dohonour to a martyr, and a power of continued, dogged, passiveresistance such as is possessed, I believe, by no other class ofmen in Europe; and these qualities formed a very powerful barrieragainst the rapacity of unconscientious proprietors. As soon asthe serfs remarked in their master a tendency to rapacity andextortion, they at once took measures to defend themselves. Theirfirst step was to sell secretly the live stock they did notactually require, and all their movable property except the fewarticles necessary for everyday use; then the little capitalrealised was carefully hidden.

When this had been effected, the proprietor might threaten andpunish as he liked, but he rarely succeeded in unearthing thetreasure. Many a peasant, under such circumstances, bore patientlythe most cruel punishment, and saw his sons taken away as recruits,and yet he persisted in declaring that he had no money to ransomhimself and his children. A spectator in such a case wouldprobably have advised him to give up his little store of money, andthereby liberate himself from persecution; but the peasantsreasoned otherwise. They were convinced, and not without reason,that the sacrifice of their little capital would merely put off theevil day, and that the persecution would very soon recommence. Inthis way they would have to suffer as before, and have theadditional mortification of feeling that they had spent to nopurpose the little that they possessed. Their fatalistic belief inthe "perhaps" (avos') came here to their aid. Perhaps theproprietor might become weary of his efforts when he saw that theyled to no result, or perhaps something might occur which wouldremove the persecutor.

It always happened, however, that when a proprietor treated hisserfs with extreme injustice and cruelty, some of them lostpatience, and sought refuge in flight. As the estates layperfectly open on all sides, and it was utterly impossible toexercise a strict supervision, nothing was easier than to run away,and the fugitive might be a hundred miles off before his absencewas noticed. But the oppressed serf was reluctant to adopt such anextreme measure. He had almost always a wife and family, and hecould not possibly take them with him; flight, therefore, wasexpatriation for life in its most terrible form. Besides this, thelife of a fugitive was by no means enviable. He was liable at anymoment to fall into the hands of the police, and to be put intoprison or sent back to his master. So little charm, indeed, didthis life present that not infrequently after a few months or a fewyears the fugitive returned of his own accord to his formerdomicile.

Regarding fugitives or passportless wanderers in general, I mayhere remark parenthetically that there were two kinds. In thefirst place, there was the young, able-bodied peasant, who fledfrom the oppression of his master or from the conscription. Such afugitive almost always sought out for himself a new domicile--generally in the southern provinces, where there was a greatscarcity of labourers, and where many proprietors habituallywelcomed all peasants who presented themselves, without making anyinquiries as to passports. In the second place, there were thosewho chose fugitivism as a permanent mode of life. These were, forthe most part, men or women of a certain age--widowers or widows--who had no close family ties, and who were too infirm or too lazyto work. The majority of these assumed the character of pilgrims.As such they could always find enough to eat, and could generallyeven collect a few roubles with which to grease the palm of anyzealous police-officer who should arrest them. For a life of thiskind Russia presented peculiar facilities. There was abundance ofmonasteries, where all comers could live for three days withoutquestions being asked, and where those who were willing to do alittle work for the patron saint might live for a much longerperiod. Then there were the towns, where the rich merchantsconsidered almsgiving as very profitable for salvation. And,lastly, there were the villages, where a professing pilgrim wassure to be hospitably received and entertained so long as herefrained from stealing and other acts too grossly inconsistentwith his assumed character. For those who contented themselveswith simple fare, and did not seek to avoid the usual privations ofa wanderer's life, these ordinary means of subsistence were amplysufficient. Those who were more ambitious and more cunning oftenemployed their talents with great success in the world of the OldRitualists and Sectarians.

The last and most desperate means of defense which the serfspossessed were fire-raising and murder. With regard to the amountof fire-raising there are no trustworthy statistics. With regardto the number of agrarian murders I once obtained some interestingstatistical data, but unfortunately lost them. I may say, however,that these cases were not very numerous. This is to be explainedin part by the patient, long-suffering character of the peasantry,and in part by the fact that the great majority of the proprietorswere by no means such inhuman taskmasters as is sometimes supposed.When a case did occur, the Administration always made a strictinvestigation--punishing the guilty with exemplary severity, andtaking no account of the provocation to which they had beensubjected. The peasantry, on the contrary--at least, when the actwas not the result of mere personal vengeance--secretly sympathisedwith "the unfortunates," and long cherished their memory as that ofmen who had suffered for the Mir.

In speaking of the serfs I have hitherto confined my attention tothe members of the Mir, or rural Commune--that is to say, thepeasants in the narrower sense of the term; but besides these therewere the Dvorovuye, or domestic servants, and of these I must add aword or two.

The Dvorovuye were domestic slaves rather than serfs in the propersense of the term. Let us, however, avoid wounding unnecessarilyRussian sensibilities by the use of the ill-sounding word. We maycall the class in question "domestics"--remembering, of course,that they were not quite domestic servants in the ordinary sense.They received no wages, were not at liberty to change masters,possessed almost no legal rights, and might be punished, hired out,or sold by their owners without any infraction of the written law.

These "domestics" were very numerous--out of all proportion to thework to be performed--and could consequently lead a very lazylife;* but the peasant considered it a great misfortune to betransferred to their ranks, for he thereby lost his share of theCommunal land and the little independence which he enjoyed. Itvery rarely happened, however, that the proprietor took an able-bodied peasant as domestic. The class generally kept up itsnumbers by the legitimate and illegitimate method of naturalincrease; and involuntary additions were occasionally made whenorphans were left without near relatives, and no other familywished to adopt them. To this class belonged the lackeys, servant-girls, cooks, coachmen, stable-boys, gardeners, and a large numberof nondescript old men and women who had no very clearly definedfunctions. If the proprietor had a private theatre or orchestra,it was from this class that the actors and musicians were drawn.Those of them who were married and had children occupied a positionintermediate between the ordinary domestic servant and the peasant.On the one hand, they received from the master a monthly allowanceof food and a yearly allowance of clothes, and they were obliged tolive in the immediate vicinity of the mansion-house; but, on theother hand, they had each a separate house or apartment, with alittle cabbage-garden, and commonly a small plot of flax. Theunmarried ones lived in all respects like ordinary domesticservants.

* Those proprietors who kept orchestras, large packs of hounds,&c., had sometimes several hundred domestic serfs.

The number of these domestic serfs being generally out of allproportion to the amount of work they had to perform, they wereimbued with a hereditary spirit of indolence, and they performedlazily and carelessly what they had to do. On the other hand, theywere often sincerely attached to the family they served, andoccasionally proved by acts their fidelity and attachment. Here isan instance out of many for which I can vouch. An old nurse, whosemistress was dangerously ill, vowed that, in the event of thepatient's recovery, she would make a pilgrimage, first to Kief, theHoly City on the Dnieper, and afterwards to Solovetsk, a muchrevered monastery on an island in the White Sea. The patientrecovered, and the old woman, in fulfilment of her vow, walked morethan two thousand miles!

This class of serfs might well be called domestic slaves, but Imust warn the reader that he ought not to use the expression whenspeaking with Russians, because they are extremely sensitive on thepoint. Serfage, they say, was something quite different fromslavery, and slavery never existed in Russia.

The first part of this assertion is perfectly true, and the secondpart perfectly false. In old times, as I have said above, slaverywas a recognised institution in Russia as in other countries. Onecan hardly read a few pages of the old chronicles without stumblingon references to slaves; and I distinctly remember--though I cannotat this moment give chapter and verse--that one of the old RussianPrinces was so valiant and so successful in his wars that duringhis reign a slave might be bought for a few coppers. As late asthe beginning of last century the domestic serfs were sold verymuch as domestic slaves used to be sold in countries where slaverywas recognised as a legal institution. Here is an example of thecustomary advertisement; I take it almost at random from the MoscowGazette of 1801:--

"TO BE SOLD: three coachmen, well trained and handsome; and twogirls, the one eighteen, and the other fifteen years of age, bothof them good-looking, and well acquainted with various kinds ofhandiwork. In the same house there are for sale two hairdressers;the one, twenty-one years of age, can read, write, play on amusical instrument, and act as huntsman; the other can dressladies' and gentlemen's hair. In the same house are sold pianosand organs."

A little farther on in the same number of the paper, a first-rateclerk, a carver, and a lackey are offered for sale, and the reasonassigned is a superabundance of the articles in question (zaizlishestvom). In some instances it seems as if the serfs and thecattle were intentionally put in the same category, as in thefollowing announcement: "In this house one can buy a coachman and aDutch cow about to calve." The style of these advertisements, andthe frequent recurrence of the same addresses, show that there wasat this time in Moscow a regular class of slave-dealers. Thehumane Alexander I. prohibited advertisements of this kind, but hedid not put down the custom which they represented, and hissuccessor, Nicholas I., took no effective measures for itsrepression.

Of the whole number of serfs belonging to the proprietors, thedomestics formed, according to the census of 1857, no less than 63/4 per cent. (6.79), and their numbers were evidently rapidlyincreasing, for in the preceding census they represented only 4.79per cent. of the whole. This fact seems all the more significantwhen we observe that during this period the number of peasant serfshad diminished.

I must now bring this long chapter to an end. My aim has been torepresent serfage in its normal, ordinary forms rather than in itsoccasional monstrous manifestations. Of these latter I have acollection containing ample materials for a whole series ofsensation novels, but I refrain from quoting them, because I do notbelieve that the criminal annals of a country give a fairrepresentation of its real condition. On the other hand, I do notwish to whitewash serfage or attenuate its evil consequences. Nogreat body of men could long wield such enormous uncontrolled powerwithout abusing it,* and no large body of men could long live undersuch power without suffering morally and materially from itspernicious influence. If serfage did not create that moral apathyand intellectual lethargy which formed, as it were, the atmosphereof Russian provincial life, it did much at least to preserve it.In short, serfage was the chief barrier to all material and moralprogress, and in a time of moral awakening such as that which Ihave described in the preceding chapter, the question ofEmancipation naturally came at once to the front.

* The number of deposed proprietors--or rather the number ofestates placed under curators in consequence of the abuse ofauthority on the part of their owners--amounted in 1859 to 215. Soat least I found in an official MS. document shown to me by thelate Nicholas Milutin.

CHAPTER XXIX

THE EMANCIPATION OF THE SERFS

The Question Raised--Chief Committee--The Nobles of the LithuanianProvinces--The Tsar's Broad Hint to the Noblesse--Enthusiasm in thePress--The Proprietors--Political Aspirations--No Opposition--TheGovernment--Public Opinion--Fear of the Proletariat--The ProvincialCommittees--The Elaboration Commission--The Question Ripens--Provincial Deputies--Discontent and Demonstrations--The Manifesto--Fundamental Principles of the Law--Illusions and Disappointment ofthe Serfs--Arbiters of the Peace--A Characteristic Incident--Redemption--Who Effected the Emancipation?

It is a fundamental principle of Russian political organisationthat all initiative in public affairs proceeds from the AutocraticPower. The widespread desire, therefore, for the Emancipation ofthe serfs did not find free expression so long as the Emperor keptsilence regarding his intentions. The educated classes watchedanxiously for some sign, and soon a sign was given to them. InMarch, 1856--a few days after the publication of the manifestoannouncing the conclusion of peace with the Western Powers--hisMajesty said to the Marshals of Noblesse in Moscow: "For theremoval of certain unfounded reports I consider it necessary todeclare to you that I have not at present the intention ofannihilating serfage; but certainly, as you yourselves know, theexisting manner of possessing serfs cannot remain unchanged. It isbetter to abolish serfage from above than to await the time when itwill begin to abolish itself from below. I request you, gentlemen,to consider how this can be put into execution, and to submit mywords to the Noblesse for their consideration."

These words were intended to sound the Noblesse and induce them tomake a voluntary proposal, but they had not the desired effect.Abolitionist enthusiasm was rare among the great nobles, and thosewho really wished to see serfage abolished considered the Imperialutterance too vague and oracular to justify them in taking theinitiative. As no further steps were taken for some time, theexcitement caused by the incident soon subsided, and many peopleassumed that the consideration of the problem had been indefinitelypostponed. "The Government," it was said, "evidently intended toraise the question, but on perceiving the indifference or hostilityof the landed proprietors, it became frightened and drew back."

The Emperor was in reality disappointed. He had expected that his"faithful Moscow Noblesse," of which he was wont to say he washimself a member, would at once respond to his call, and that theancient capital would have the honour of beginning the work. Andif the example were thus given by Moscow, he had no doubt that itwould soon be followed by the other provinces. He now perceivedthat the fundamental principles on which the Emancipation should beeffected must be laid down by the Government, and for this purposehe created a secret committee composed of several great officers ofState.

This "Chief Committee for Peasant Affairs," as it was afterwardscalled, devoted six months to studying the history of the question.Emancipation schemes were by no means a new phenomenon in Russia.Ever since the time of Catherine II. the Government had thought ofimproving the condition of the serfs, and on more than one occasiona general emancipation had been contemplated. In this way thequestion had slowly ripened, and certain fundamental principles hadcome to be pretty generally recognised. Of these principles themost important was that the State should not consent to any projectwhich would uproot the peasant from the soil and allow him towander about at will; for such a measure would render thecollection of the taxes impossible, and in all probability producethe most frightful agrarian disorders. And to this generalprinciple there was an important corollary: if severe restrictionswere to be placed on free migration, it would be necessary toprovide the peasantry with land in the immediate vicinity of thevillages; otherwise they must inevitably fall back under the powerof the proprietors, and a new and worse kind of serfage would thusbe created. But in order to give land to the peasantry it would benecessary to take it from the proprietors; and this expropriationseemed to many a most unjustifiable infringement of the sacredrights of property. It was this consideration that had restrainedNicholas from taking any decisive measures with regard to serfage;and it had now considerable weight with the members of thecommittee, who were nearly all great land-owners.

Notwithstanding the strenuous exertions of the Grand DukeConstantine, who had been appointed a member for the expresspurpose of accelerating the proceedings, the committee did not showas much zeal and energy as was desired, and orders were given totake some decided step. At that moment a convenient opportunitypresented itself.

In the Lithuanian Provinces, where the nobles were Polish by originand sympathies, the miserable condition of the peasantry hadinduced the Government in the preceding reign to limit thearbitrary power of the serf-owners by so-called Inventories, inwhich the mutual obligations of masters and serfs were regulatedand defined. These Inventories had caused great dissatisfaction,and the proprietors now proposed that they should be revised. Ofthis the Government determined to take advantage. On the somewhatviolent assumption that these proprietors wished to emancipatetheir serfs, an Imperial rescript was prepared approving of theirsupposed desire, and empowering them to form committees for thepreparation of definite projects.* In the rescript itself the wordemancipation was studiously avoided, but there could be no doubt asto the implied meaning, for it was expressly stated in thesupplementary considerations that "the abolition of serfage must beeffected not suddenly, but gradually." Four days later theMinister of the Interior, in accordance with a secret order fromthe Emperor, sent a circular to the Governors and Marshals ofNoblesse all over Russia proper, informing them that the nobles ofthe Lithuanian Provinces "had recognised the necessity ofliberating the peasants," and that "this noble intention" hadafforded peculiar satisfaction to his Majesty. A copy of therescript and the fundamental principles to be observed accompaniedthe circular, "in case the nobles of other provinces should expressa similar desire."

* This celebrated document is known as "The Rescript to Nazimof."More than once in the course of conversation I did all in my power,within the limits of politeness and discretion, to extract fromGeneral Nazimof a detailed account of this important episode, butmy efforts were unsuccessful.

This circular produced an immense sensation throughout the country.No one could for a moment misunderstand the suggestion that thenobles of other provinces MIGHT POSSIBLY express a desire toliberate their serfs. Such vague words, when spoken by anautocrat, have a very definite and unmistakable meaning, whichprudent loyal subjects have no difficulty in understanding. If anydoubted, their doubts were soon dispelled, for the Emperor, a fewweeks later, publicly expressed a hope that, with the help of Godand the co-operation of the nobles, the work would be successfullyaccomplished.

The die was cast, and the Government looked anxiously to see theresult.

The periodical Press--which was at once the product and thefomenter of the liberal aspirations--hailed the raising of thequestion with boundless enthusiasm. The Emancipation, it was said,would certainly open a new and glorious epoch in the nationalhistory. Serfage was described as an ulcer that had long beenpoisoning the national blood; as an enormous weight under which thewhole nation groaned; as an insurmountable obstacle, preventing allmaterial and moral progress; as a cumbrous load which rendered allfree, vigorous action impossible, and prevented Russia from risingto the level of the Western nations. If Russia had succeeded instemming the flood of adverse fortune in spite of this millstoneround her neck, what might she not accomplish when free anduntrammelled? All sections of the literary world had arguments tooffer in support of the foregone conclusion. The moralistsdeclared that all the prevailing vices were the product of serfage,and that moral progress was impossible in an atmosphere of slavery;the lawyers held that the arbitrary authority of the proprietorsover the peasants had no legal basis; the economists explained thatfree labour was an indispensable condition of industrial andcommercial prosperity; the philosophical historians showed that thenormal historical development of the country demanded the immediateabolition of this superannuated remnant of barbarism; and thewriters of the sentimental, gushing type poured forth endlesseffusions about brotherly love to the weak and the oppressed. In aword, the Press was for the moment unanimous, and displayed afeverish excitement which demanded a liberal use of superlatives.

This enthusiastic tone accorded perfectly with the feelings of alarge section of the nobles. Nearly the whole of the Noblesse wasmore or less affected by the newborn enthusiasm for everythingjust, humanitarian, and liberal. The aspirations found, of course,their most ardent representatives among the educated youth; butthey were by no means confined to the younger men, who had passedthrough the universities and had always regarded serfage as a stainon the national honour. Many a Saul was found among the prophets.Many an old man, with grey hairs and grandchildren, who had all hislife placidly enjoyed the fruits of serf labour, was now heard tospeak of serfage as an antiquated institution which could not bereconciled with modern humanitarian ideas; and not a few of allages, who had formerly never thought of reading books ornewspapers, now perused assiduously the periodical literature, andpicked up the liberal and humanitarian phrases with which it wasfilled.

This Abolitionist fervour was considerably augmented by certainpolitical aspirations which did not appear in the newspapers, butwhich were at that time very generally entertained. In spite ofthe Press-censure a large section of the educated classes hadbecome acquainted with the political literature of France andGermany, and had imbibed therefrom an unbounded admiration forConstitutional government. A Constitution, it was thought, wouldnecessarily remove all political evils and create something like apolitical Millennium. And it was not to be a Constitution of theordinary sort--the fruit of compromise between hostile politicalparties--but an institution designed calmly according to the latestresults of political science, and so constructed that all classeswould voluntarily contribute to the general welfare. The necessaryprelude to this happy era of political liberty was, of course, theabolition of serfage. When the nobles had given up their powerover their serfs they would receive a Constitution as anindemnification and reward.

There were, however, many nobles of the old school who remainedimpervious to all these new feelings and ideas. On them theraising of the Emancipation question had a very different effect.They had no source of revenue but their estates, and they could notconceive the possibility of working their estates without serflabour. If the peasant was indolent and careless even under strictsupervision, what would he become when no longer under theauthority of a master? If the profits from farming were alreadysmall, what would they be when no one would work without wages?And this was not the worst, for it was quite evident from thecircular that the land question was to be raised, and that aconsiderable portion of each estate would be transferred, at leastfor a time, to the emancipated peasants.

To the proprietors who looked at the question in this way theprospect of Emancipation was certainly not at all agreeable, but wemust not imagine that they felt as English land-owners would feelif threatened by a similar danger. In England a hereditary estatehas for the family a value far beyond what it would bring in themarket. It is regarded as one and indivisible, and anydismemberment of it would be looked upon as a grave familymisfortune. In Russia, on the contrary, estates have nothing ofthis semi-sacred character, and may be at any time dismemberedwithout outraging family feeling or traditional associations.Indeed, it is not uncommon that when a proprietor dies, leavingonly one estate and several children, the property is broken upinto fractions and divided among the heirs. Even the prospect ofpecuniary sacrifice did not alarm the Russians so much as it wouldalarm Englishmen. Men who keep no accounts and take little thoughtfor the morrow are much less averse to making pecuniary sacrifices--whether for a wise or a foolish purpose--than those who carefullyarrange their mode of life according to their income.

Still, after due allowance has been made for these peculiarities,it must be admitted that the feeling of dissatisfaction and alarmwas very widespread. Even Russians do not like the prospect oflosing a part of their land and income. No protest, however, wasentered, and no opposition was made. Those who were hostile to themeasure were ashamed to show themselves selfish and unpatriotic.At the same time they knew very well that the Emperor, if hewished, could effect the Emancipation in spite of them, and thatresistance on their part would draw down upon them the Imperialdispleasure, without affording any compensating advantage. Theyknew, too, that there was a danger from below, so that any uselessshow of opposition would be like playing with matches in a powder-magazine. The serfs would soon hear that the Tsar desired to setthem free, and they might, if they suspected that the proprietorswere trying to frustrate the Tsar's benevolent intentions, useviolent measures to get rid of the opposition. The idea ofagrarian massacres had already taken possession of many timidminds. Besides this, all classes of the proprietors felt that ifthe work was to be done, it should be done by the Noblesse and notby the bureaucracy. If it were effected by the nobles theinterests of the land-owners would be duly considered, but if itwere effected by the Administration without their concurrence andco-operation their interests would be neglected, and there wouldinevitably be an enormous amount of jobbery and corruption. Inaccordance with this view, the Noblesse corporations of the variousprovinces successively requested permission to form committees forthe consideration of the question, and during the year 1858 acommittee was opened in almost every province in which serfageexisted.

In this way the question was apparently handed over for solution tothe nobles, but in reality the Noblesse was called upon merely toadvise, and not to legislate. The Government had not only laiddown the fundamental principles of the scheme; it continuallysupervised the work of construction, and it reserved to itself theright of modifying or rejecting the projects proposed by thecommittees.

According to these fundamental principles the serfs should beemancipated gradually, so that for some time they would remainattached to the glebe and subject to the authority of theproprietors. During this transition period they should redeem bymoney payments or labour their houses and gardens, and enjoy inusufruct a certain quantity of land, sufficient to enable them tosupport themselves and to fulfil their obligations to the State aswell as to the proprietor. In return for this land they should paya yearly rent in money, produce or labour over and above the yearlysum paid for the redemption of their houses and gardens. As towhat should be done after the expiry of the transition period, theGovernment seems to have had no clearly conceived intentions.Probably it hoped that by that time the proprietors and theiremancipated serfs would have invented some convenient modusvivendi, and that nothing but a little legislative regulation wouldbe necessary. But radical legislation is like the letting-out ofwater. These fundamental principles, adopted at first with a viewto mere immediate practical necessity, soon acquired a verydifferent significance. To understand this we must return to theperiodical literature.

Until the serf question came to be discussed, the reformaspirations were very vague, and consequently there was aremarkable unanimity among their representatives. The greatmajority of the educated classes were unanimously of opinion thatRussia should at once adopt from the West all those liberalprinciples and institutions the exclusion of which had preventedthe country from rising to the level of the Western nations. Butvery soon symptoms of a schism became apparent. Whilst theliterature in general was still preaching the doctrine that Russiashould adopt everything that was "liberal," a few voices began tobe heard warning the unwary that much which bore the name ofliberal was in reality already antiquated and worthless--thatRussia ought not to follow blindly in the footsteps of othernations, but ought rather to profit by their experience, and avoidthe errors into which they had fallen. The chief of these errorswas, according to these new teachers, the abnormal development ofindividualism--the adoption of that principle of laissez fairewhich forms the basis of what may be called the Orthodox School ofPolitical Economists. Individualism and unrestricted competition,it was said, have now reached in the West an abnormal and monstrousdevelopment. Supported by the laissez faire principle, they haveled--and must always lead--to the oppression of the weak, thetyranny of capital, the impoverishment of the masses for thebenefit of the few, and the formation of a hungry, dangerousProletariat! This has already been recognised by the most advancedthinkers of France and Germany. If the older countries cannot atonce cure those evils, that is no reason for Russia to inoculateherself with them. She is still at the commencement of her career,and it would be folly for her to wander voluntarily for ages in theDesert, when a direct route to the Promised Land has been alreadydiscovered.

In order to convey some idea of the influence which this teachingexercised, I must here recall, at the risk of repeating myself,what I said in a former chapter. The Russians, as I have therepointed out, have a peculiar way of treating political and socialquestions. Having received their political education from books,they naturally attribute to theoretical considerations animportance which seems to us exaggerated. When any important ortrivial question arises, they at once launch into a sea ofphilosophical principles, and pay less attention to the littleobjects close at hand than to the big ones that appear on thedistant horizon of the future. And when they set to work at anypolitical reform they begin ab ovo. As they have no traditionalprejudices to fetter them, and no traditional principles to leadthem, they naturally take for their guidance the latest conclusionsof political philosophy.

Bearing this in mind, let us see how it affected the Emancipationquestion. The Proletariat--described as a dangerous monster whichwas about to swallow up society in Western Europe, and which mightat any moment cross the frontier unless kept out by vigorousmeasures--took possession of the popular imagination, and arousedthe fears of the reading public. To many it seemed that the bestmeans of preventing the formation of a Proletariat in Russia wasthe securing of land for the emancipated serfs and the carefulpreservation of the rural Commune. "Now is the moment," it wassaid, "for deciding the important question whether Russia is tofall a prey, like the Western nations, to this terrible evil, orwhether she is to protect herself for ever against it. In thedecision of this question lies the future destiny of the country.If the peasants be emancipated without land, or if those Communalinstitutions which give to every man a share of the soil and securethis inestimable boon for the generations still unborn be nowabolished, a Proletariat will be rapidly formed, and the peasantrywill become a disorganised mass of homeless wanderers like theEnglish agricultural labourers. If, on the contrary, a fair shareof land be granted to them, and if the Commune be made proprietorof the land ceded, the danger of a Proletariat is for ever removed,and Russia will thereby set an example to the civilised world!Never has a nation had such an opportunity of making an enormousleap forward on the road of progress, and never again will theopportunity occur. The Western nations have discovered their errorwhen it is too late--when the peasantry have been already deprivedof their land, and the labouring classes of the towns have alreadyfallen a prey to the insatiable cupidity of the capitalists. Invain their most eminent thinkers warn and exhort. Ordinaryremedies are no longer of any avail. But Russia may avoid thesedangers, if she but act wisely and prudently in this great matter.The peasants are still in actual, if not legal, possession of theland, and there is as yet no Proletariat in the towns. All that isnecessary, therefore, is to abolish the arbitrary authority of theproprietors without expropriating the peasants, and withoutdisturbing the existing Communal institutions, which form the bestbarrier against pauperism."

These ideas were warmly espoused by many proprietors, and exerciseda very great influence on the deliberations of the ProvincialCommittees. In these committees there were generally two groups.The majorities, whilst making large concessions to the claims ofjustice and expediency, endeavoured to defend, as far as possible,the interests of their class; the minorities, though by no meansindifferent to the interests of the class to which they belonged,allowed the more abstract theoretical considerations to bepredominant. At first the majorities did all in their power toevade the fundamental principles laid down by the Government asmuch too favourable to the peasantry; but when they perceived thatpublic opinion, as represented by the Press, went much further thanthe Government, they clung to these fundamental principles--whichsecured at least the fee simple of the estate to the landlord--astheir anchor of safety. Between the two parties arose naturally astrong spirit of hostility, and the Government, which wished tohave the support of the minorities, found it advisable that bothshould present their projects for consideration.

As the Provincial Committees worked independently, there wasconsiderable diversity in the conclusions at which they arrived.The task of codifying these conclusions, and elaborating out ofthem a general scheme of Emancipation, was entrusted to a specialImperial Commission, composed partly of officials and partly oflanded proprietors named by the Emperor.* Those who believed thatthe question had really been handed over to the Noblesse assumedthat this Commission would merely arrange the materials presentedby the Provincial Committees, and that the Emancipation Law wouldthereafter be elaborated by a National Assembly of deputies electedby the nobles. In reality the Commission, working in St.Petersburg under the direct guidance and control of the Government,fulfilled a very different and much more important function. Usingthe combined projects merely as a storehouse from which it coulddraw the proposals it desired, it formed a new project of its own,which ultimately received, after undergoing modification in detail,the Imperial assent. Instead of being a mere chancellerie, as manyexpected, it became in a certain sense the author of theEmancipation Law.

* Known as the Redaktsionnaya Komissiya, or Elaboration Commission.Strictly speaking, there were two, but they are commonly spoken ofas one.

There was, as we have seen, in nearly all the Provincial Committeesa majority and a minority, the former of which strove to defend theinterests of the proprietors, whilst the latter paid more attentionto theoretical considerations, and endeavoured to secure for thepeasantry a large amount of land and Communal self-government. Inthe Commission there were the same two parties, but their relativestrength was very different. Here the men of theory, instead offorming a minority, were more numerous than their opponents, andenjoyed the support of the Government, which regulated theproceedings. In its instructions we see how much the question hadripened under the influence of the theoretical considerations.There is no longer any trace of the idea that the Emancipationshould be gradual; on the contrary, it is expressly declared thatthe immediate effect of the law should be the complete abolition ofthe proprietor's authority. There is even evidence of a clearintention of preventing the proprietor as far as possible fromexercising any influence over his former serfs. The sharpdistinction between the land occupied by the village and the arableland to be ceded in usufruct likewise disappears, and it is merelysaid that efforts should be made to enable the peasants to becomeproprietors of the land they required.

The aim of the Government had thus become clear and well defined.The task to be performed was to transform the serfs at once, andwith the least possible disturbance of the existing economicconditions, into a class of small Communal proprietors--that is tosay, a class of free peasants possessing a house and garden and ashare of the Communal land. To effect this it was merely necessaryto declare the serf personally free, to draw a clear line ofdemarcation between the Communal land and the rest of the estate,and to determine the price or rent which should be paid for thisCommunal property, inclusive of the land on which the village wasbuilt.

The law was prepared in strict accordance with these principles.As to the amount of land to be ceded, it was decided that theexisting arrangements, founded on experience, should, as a generalrule, be preserved--in other words, the land actually enjoyed bythe peasants should be retained by them; and in order to preventextreme cases of injustice, a maximum and a minimum were fixed foreach district. In like manner, as to the dues, it was decided thatthe existing arrangements should be taken as the basis of thecalculation, but that the sum should be modified according to theamount of land ceded. At the same time facilities were to be givenfor the transforming of the labour dues into yearly money payments,and for enabling the peasants to redeem them, with the assistanceof the Government, in the form of credit.

This idea of redemption created, at first, a feeling of alarm amongthe proprietors. It was bad enough to be obliged to cede a largepart of the estates in usufruct, but it seemed to be much worse tohave to sell it. Redemption appeared to be a species of wholesaleconfiscation. But very soon it became evident that the redeemingof the land was profitable for both parties. Cession in perpetualusufruct was felt to be in reality tantamount to alienation of theland, whilst the immediate redemption would enable the proprietors,who had generally little or no ready money to pay their debts, toclear their estates from mortgages, and to make the outlaysnecessary for the transition to free labour. The majority of theproprietors, therefore, said openly: "Let the Government give us asuitable compensation in money for the land that is taken from us,so that we may be at once freed from all further trouble andannoyance."

When it became known that the Commission was not merely arrangingand codifying the materials, but elaborating a law of its own andregularly submitting its decisions for Imperial confirmation, afeeling of dissatisfaction appeared all over the country. Thenobles perceived that the question was being taken out of theirhands, and was being solved by a small body composed of bureaucratsand nominees of the Government. After having made a voluntarysacrifice of their rights, they were being unceremoniously pushedaside. They had still, however, the means of correcting this. TheEmperor had publicly promised that before the project should becomelaw deputies from the Provincial Committees should be summoned toSt. Petersburg to make objections and propose amendments.

The Commission and the Government would have willingly dispensedwith all further advice from the nobles, but it was necessary toredeem the Imperial promise. Deputies were therefore summoned tothe capital, but they were not allowed to form, as they hoped, apublic assembly for the discussion of the question. All theirefforts to hold meetings were frustrated, and they were requiredmerely to answer in writing a list of printed questions regardingmatters of detail. The fundamental principles, they were told, hadalready received the Imperial sanction, and were consequently